


The Chicken or the Egg

by wendelah1



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, First Time, Humor, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-19
Updated: 2009-11-19
Packaged: 2017-10-03 09:40:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wendelah1/pseuds/wendelah1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As foreplay, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully discuss Wittgenstein, because there is nothing sexier than Ordinary-Language Philosophy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Chicken or the Egg

**Author's Note:**

> Much love to idunnoh for the beta and the inspiration.

"Mulder. What do you think came first, the chicken, or the egg?" Scully was sitting cross-legged on the sofa, working the Sunday New York Times Crossword puzzle. She was whizzing through it, filling in the blanks at a breath-taking clip, and still had the brain power left to ponder one of philosophy's classic causality dilemmas. He shook off the haze of lust that close proximity to this woman put him in and put on his thinking cap.

"Well, Scully," he began slowly, "Of course, you already know this, but I would suppose first came the one-celled organism, then the two-celled organism. Next would be the multi-cellular organism, then at some point, organisms would evolve that had eggs as part of their reproductive system. Now, if you define "egg" as any sort of egg, then that would be around before chickens evolved. But if what you mean by egg is precisely the sort of egg that would produce a chicken, then they would have to come into existence simultaneously, since until the egg had actually produced a chicken, one would have no basis on which to call it a chicken egg." He paused, to breathe, and noticed that his partner had stopped working on the crossword, and was staring at him.

"I just made that up, of course." He smiled. She was looking at him like she wanted to...no, that had to be coming from his head. "I mean, until you asked, I had never really thought seriously about the question. Why did you ask me that?" She was still staring at him, and it was starting to unnerve him a bit. He decided a diversionary tactic was in order. He reached over and grabbed the bag of sunflower seeds off of the coffee table. "What do you think, Dr. Scully," he said with just a hint of a tease in his voice. "You must have had a reason to bring it up in the first place." He took a seed out and popped it into his mouth and started rolled it around with his tongue to extract the meat. Shit! She had stopped looking him. She used to be pretty interested in what his mouth could do with those seeds. He slumped down. She was talking again. And she had uncrossed her legs, had the pencil in hand, and had started once again on the puzzle.

"Well, Mulder, since you asked, one of the clues in the crossword was for the word infinity. That made me think about Wittgenstein and his response to the mathematics concept of the infinitely repeating decimal." She put the pencil down and looked up. Mulder took note of this, sat up, and took another seed out of the bag. "Wittgenstein felt that numbers only exist as a human invention, and that as such they must have a relationship to the physical world. For example," she continued, "while in theory, a repeated decimal could go on indefinitely, until a person wrote it out, it would not exist, and therefore would not be infinite."

"So, let me get this straight. No number can be infinite _because no one can write it down_. That is what you are saying." Mulder knew Scully was a pragmatist at heart but still. This seemed extreme, even for her.

"That is what Wittgenstein said, but yes. I mean, think about it, Mulder. Take, for example, the width of that sunflower seed you are ready to pop into your mouth." As she glanced over at him, he quickly took the seed, reached over and put it in her palm. Just as quickly, she put down the crossword, and moved over to sit next to him. He felt his mouth go dry. She picked up his hand, and let the seed he had just given her drop back into his palm.

"What measurement would you give it? About a third of inch, maybe a little less, but for the sake of argument, let's call it one third." She took his hand and starting trailing her first and middle fingers up his forearm as she talked. "You can convert one third into an infinitely repeating decimal, .33333, and so on." Mulder felt the feather-light sensation she was tracing travel from his forearm directly to his groin, and he shifted a little bit in response. "Now as you see, even though the infinite number doesn't exist except in theory, the measurement still does, and certainly, the sunflower seed does as well." At that, she picked up the seed from his hand and placed it onto his lip. He opened his mouth, took the seed from her fingers and then took her hand in his, and brushed his fingers over hers gently.

"Where are you going with this, Scully? Even I can see we aren't talking about the evolution of poultry any more." He took her hands and brought them up to his mouth and began to nuzzle her fingertips.

"Where do you want to go with it, Mulder? I can see this discussion heading in any number of different, but equally fruitful directions." Her voice was soft, and her eyes looked like he always thought they would when he got this close to kissing her. He pulled her over and settled her firmly onto his lap. "Well, yes, that is one of the possibilities..." she said, sighing a little. He hesitated, then decided to forgo the discussion and began kissing her neck, and nipping her earlobe.

Things were progressing better than he had any reason to hope for when he had arrived at her apartment earlier, bearing bagels, regular and light cream cheese and the chai non-fat soy latte she had requested. This was amazing. He was making out with Scully. She was sighing and moaning and he was getting harder by the minute, but he just couldn't get it out of his head. What did Wittgenstein, and number theory have to do with evolutionary biology. He just couldn't see the connection. And he could always see the connection. Dammit. He was going to have to ask her. He hoped she wouldn't get too mad.

"Scully." God, she was taking off her shirt. "Wait, let me. I want to undress you myself," he heard himself blurt out.

"Okay. I'd like that," she said with a little giggle. She put her arms down and looked at him expectantly. She turned her head to one side, looking puzzled. "Mulder. What's wrong? You look...distracted. " Her voice fell. "You haven't changed your mind, have you?"

"No, no, no nothing like that. It's just that I keep thinking about what you were talking about earlier, about number theory and Wittgenstein, and well, the chicken and the egg. Which came first. I can't figure out how they're connected. It's going to drive me crazy. Scully. You have to tell me, then I promise, I will take you into your bedroom and make you forget all about the philosophy of science."

"Mulder, you already made the connection yourself." She said this rather patiently, all things considered. "Evolutionary biologists are clear that the egg came first. It would have had to, to produce the chicken in the first place. But since language, like mathematics, is a human invention, until the chicken arrives, and is named a chicken, the egg it came from can't be named a chicken egg. Mulder. We can continue this later, if you like. Right now, I have a different topic I would like to discuss." She got off his lap, took his hand and pulled him up, and starting pushing him ahead of her toward her bedroom.

"Sure. That would be fine. What did you want to talk to me about?" He hoped it wasn't anything too complex, because the blood flow to his brain was becoming impaired, he was certain. She had pushed him down onto her bed and was unbuckling the belt from his jeans.

"Human Sexuality. Did you know that a woman reaches her sexual peak in her thirties, Mulder?" He finally had her bra off and could get his eyes and his hands on her sweet little breasts. Mulder had become a convert to the idea that more than a handful or a mouthful was ... superfluous.

"Uh, I believe that I have heard that, yes. But, as a scientist, you should understand my need for a more empirical approach to the subject. Are you willing to put that theory to the test, Scully?"

"Yes, Mulder. Yes Mulder. Yes Mulder. Yes." Mulder had never stopped believing in extreme possibilities, but in some things, he was happy to stick with the basics. She came first. He came next. End of story.


End file.
